Few journalists cared to predict the outcome of the case, and several commented on the Court's struggle to resolve the parties' strong claims. In the Atlantic, Garrett Epps attributes that difficulty to the quality of the oral argument, which he characterizes as "two inexperienced pilots sail[ing] into a legal Bermuda Triangle." But to David Savage of the Los Angeles Times, the Justices "sounded as though they are inclined to set a limit to the free-speech rule to permit lawsuits against those who target ordinary citizens with especially personal and hurtful attacks." On this blog, Lyle Denniston suggests that when the Justices discuss this case on Friday, they may "craft a way to write into the First Amendment a "funeral exception' to the right to speak out in public in outrageous and hurtful ways." Tony Mauro of Supreme Court Insider expects the opposite, reporting that "some Supreme Court justices on Wednesday seemed reluctant to upset First Amendment precedents that protect even the most obnoxious speech from punishment." In Slate, Dahlia Lithwick suggests that "at least a few of the justices really, really, really just hate the Phelps family and its manner of protest, and they might even be willing to whip up a little new First Amendment law to prove it." And at her Crossroads blog for CBS News, Jan Crawford opines that after today's argument it is clear that "Justice Alito has emerged as the Court’s most insightful and strategic questioner."

Briefly:

ABC News interviews K. Ryan Jones, a University of Kansas student who has made a documentary about the Westboro Baptist Church.

And finally, the Washington Post has coverage of the competing news conferences that followed today's argument.

Merits Case Pages and Archives

On Monday, the justices met for their September 25 conference. The justices removed Trump v. International Refugee Assistance Project and Trump v. Hawaii from the court's October sitting. We expect orders from this conference on Thursday. The October 2017 term will begin on Monday, October 2. The calendar for the October sitting is available on the court's website.

Major Cases

Trump v. International Refugee Assistance Project(1) Whether respondents’ challenge to the temporary suspension of entry of aliens abroad under Section 2(c) of Executive Order No. 13,780 is justiciable; (2) whether Section 2(c)’s temporary suspension of entry violates the Establishment Clause; (3) whether the global injunction, which rests on alleged injury to a single individual plaintiff, is impermissibly overbroad; and (4) whether the challenges to Section 2(c) became moot on June 14, 2017.

Gill v. Whitford(1) Whether the district court violated Vieth v. Jubelirer when it held that it had the authority to entertain a statewide challenge to Wisconsin’s redistricting plan, instead of requiring a district-by-district analysis; (2) whether the district court violated Vieth when it held that Wisconsin’s redistricting plan was an impermissible partisan gerrymander, even though it was undisputed that the plan complies with traditional redistricting principles; (3) whether the district court violated Vieth by adopting a watered-down version of the partisan-gerrymandering test employed by the plurality in Davis v. Bandemer; (4) whether the defendants are entitled, at a minimum, to present additional evidence showing that they would have prevailed under the district court’s test, which the court announced only after the record had closed; and (5) whether partisan-gerrymandering claims are justiciable.

Carpenter v. United StatesWhether the warrantless seizure and search of historical cellphone records revealing the location and movements of a cellphone user over the course of 127 days is permitted by the Fourth Amendment.

Conference of September 25, 2017

Collins v. Virginia Whether the Fourth Amendment's automobile exception permits a police officer, uninvited and without a warrant, to enter private property, approach a house and search a vehicle parked a few feet from the house.

Butka v. Sessions Whether the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit erred in this case by holding that it had no jurisdiction to review the denial of a motion to reopen by the Board of Immigration Appeals, where the review sought was limited to assessing the legal framework upon which the sua sponte request was made.

National Institute of Family and Life Advocates v. Becerra Whether the free speech clause or the free exercise clause of the First Amendment prohibits California from compelling licensed pro-life centers to post information on how to obtain a state-funded abortion and from compelling unlicensed pro-life centers to disseminate a disclaimer to clients on site and in any print and digital advertising.

On August 16, Judge Jon Newman of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit gave a lecture, “The Supreme Court — Then and Now,” in which he compared the Supreme Court today to the court in October Term 1957, when Newman served as a law clerk to Chief Justice Earl Warren.